Skip to main content

ETHNOS_APP

Home • Search • Journals • List 0

Gunshots, Sociability and Community Defence. Shooting Associations in Imperial Germany and its Colonies

Bibliographic Data

ID12858596
AuthorsNicola Camilleri (0000-0002-1596-9231, University of Padua, corresponding author)
Year2022
Volume20
Issue2
Pages236-257
Publication date2022-05-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Modern European History (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1611-8944 • E-ISSN: 2631-9764
PublisherSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/16118944221091113
OpenAlexW4225295007
LanguageEN
Citations received1

Shooting associations represented one of the most popular expressions of sociability in Imperial Germany. Their club houses were to be found in large and medium-sized towns, in villages, and in overseas colonies, too. Middle class men would regularly gather to practice shooting and to organize competitions, activities characterized by clearly gendered rituals of social life. Based on values of loyalty to the Emperor and to fellow members, association life closely reflected the ideological agenda of the protestant Kaiserreich. Their popularity and pervasiveness earned shooting associations a place in George Mosse's groundbreaking work on the nationalization of the masses. Nevertheless, they have been mostly neglected in research on bourgeois sociability and on militarism. This article is the first scholarly attempt to study this form of associationism in Imperial Germany and its colonies. Having developed out of the old tradition of civic militias, shooting societies lost their primary policing and military function during the 19th century. However, community defence remained an essential task, which was viewed then as a moral and civil, rather than military, matter. The article examines the cultural and social aspects of shooting societies and relates this form of associationism to wider issues of military culture in the Kaiserreich

Club · Ideology · Loyalty · Militarism · Political science · Politics · Sociology · European history and politics · European Political History Analysis · Gender Studies · Historical Gender and Feminism Studies · Law

  • Rethinking the Colonial in the Greater War

    Open Access•Dónal Hassett•Contemporary European History•2025

Unique citing works1
Citations per year1
Citation span2025 - 2025 (1)
Citation velocityrecent
Highly citedNo
Ethnos_APP • Open Source Project • MIT License • Frontend v2.0.0 • Privacy and Cookies • API Documentation: api.ethnos.app/docs • API Source Code: GitHub • DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17049435 • Frontend Source Code: GitHub • DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17050053 • cruz.rio.br • Expectantes Misericordiae